Editorials
Wednesday, June 6, 2001
AN experiment with boys and guns has confirmed what most people already knew: Firearms pose a dangerous fascination for youngsters and, at the very least, need to be kept far beyond their reach. A far better precaution would be a requirement that new firearms be equipped with safety devices to prevent accidental shootings. Experiment proves
fascination with guns
puts kids at riskThe issue: An experiment has
demonstrated that children are at risk
from playing with real guns if they
are within their grasp.In the experiment, 64 Atlanta-area boys aged 8 to 12 were brought in groups of two or three into a room with toys on a counter and two water pistols and a real .380-caliber, unloaded handgun in cabinets. They were observed through a one-way mirror.
Forty-eight of the boys found the handgun and about half said afterward they thought it was a toy. Thirty of the boys touched the gun and 16 pulled the trigger. Seventeen of the boys who handled the gun and six who pulled the trigger came from gun-owning families, and more than 90 percent of those who handled the gun had received some sort of gun safety inspection in school or at home.
"They did everything from point it at each other to look down the barrel themselves," said Dr. Geoffrey Jackson, the pediatrician who conducted the study. "The scariest thing is when the children picked up that gun and looked straight down the barrel."
Surveys indicating the access that children have to firearms are just as scary. As many as 61 percent of gun-owning households with children store at least one firearm unlocked and/or loaded. Nearly a quarter of the parents in such households say they trust their 4- to 12-year-old children with loaded firearms.
No wonder that the gun-related death rate of children in the United States is 12 times higher than the combined rate of 25 other industrialized nations. In a recent year, firearms killed 5,285 children in the United States, compared with 153 in Canada, 109 in France, 57 in Germany, 19 in Great Britain and none in Japan.
Hawaii, which has as many as 400,000 registered firearms, has the broadest state law in the nation in trying to prevent children from gaining access to guns. Storing or leaving a firearm, whether loaded or not, within reach or easy access of a child under 16 years of age is a misdemeanor, regardless of whether it was related to an incident in which the gun was fired. In most cases, though, violations will be learned after the damage has been inflicted.
Children would be safer if gun manufacturers were required to install trigger locks on all new guns and to use existing technology that "personalizes" guns by limiting their discharge to owners. In the absence of regulation by the Consumer Product Safety Commission, gun manufacturers should be held by law to specific requirements for the safety of children.
The only clinic in Hawaii that provides dental services to seriously ill and injured patients as well as the poor will continue to operate for another year, thanks to $305,000 in funds from the state Health Department. However, state lawmakers and Hawaii's congressional delegation should be in full support of the clinic and searching for ways to provide a stable source of funding for it. Dental clinic gets
reprieve from closureThe issue: The unique program
receives funds to keep it going but it
remains on shaky financial ground.The clinic, operated by The Queen's Medical Center, was to close this month because of an annual $350,000 loss, due mainly to reductions in Medicare and Medicaid payments.
It is a worthwhile program because it serves not only the poor, but also disabled patients and accident victims who otherwise would have to be flown to the mainland for treatment.
Further, it is the only one in Hawaii with a residency program to train dentists in critical care, specialists who are in short supply here. Dr. Mark Greer, chief of the state's Dental Health Division and himself a graduate of the residency program, said the clinic is "a tremendous community service and also provides very good training."
It isn't a top-heavy, bureaucratic agency. Treating more than 4,000 patients a year, it has eight paid staff members, including the director and two residents, with about 45 dentists volunteering their services.
Hawaii's isolation demands that such critical care service be available here. Flying patients to the mainland is neither cost effective nor medically practical, and dental care should not be denied to those who are impoverished.
Although the clinic is increasing fees, collecting from patients who can afford to pay, and seeking grants to sustain its operations, the multi-faceted program deserves assistance from the government.
Published by Oahu Publications Inc., a subsidiary of Black Press.Don Kendall, President
John Flanagan, publisher and editor in chief 529-4748; jflanagan@starbulletin.com
Frank Bridgewater, managing editor 529-4791; fbridgewater@starbulletin.com
Michael Rovner, assistant managing editor 529-4768; mrovner@starbulletin.com
Lucy Young-Oda, assistant managing editor 529-4762; lyoungoda@starbulletin.com The Honolulu Star-Bulletin (USPS 249460) is published daily by
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